Play and learning in the digital age

Abstract

This chapter examines the cultural history and discursive construction of play and learning, drawing attention to the way that both human activities have been differentiated but are now becoming ever more blurred. This is analysed in the context of changes brought about both by the technical affordances of digital technologies and the political economy of digital culture which has focused on turning learning into a commodity purchased and used in the home as much as in the school. The existential open-ended nature of play itself has been significantly influenced by video gaming and the turn to playfulness in public culture more generally. The chapter argues that it is important not to subordinate play as an instrumental developmental function of learning and that learning itself should not be conflated with the outcomes of the formal education system.